"The three hardest tasks in the world are neither physical feats nor intellectual achievements, but moral acts: to return love for hate, to include the excluded, and to say, "I was wrong." - Sydney J. Harris

4/13/2007

Trial Tactics

So for the end of my clinic this morning I went to watch a trial in federal court. I sat through an hour and a half of direct examination of the plaintiff who was a former cop who was suing for wrongful termination. He sounded like he had a decent claim, then came the cross examination.

First, he failed a urinalysis.

Second, he had been written up twice for failure to take care of evidence as the evidence officer.

Third, he started telling other cops that a cop on the drug task force was selling, two weeks after that cop had busted the plaintiff's cousin for dealing meth.